An eight-year-old from San Diego wonders about the origin of the term bullseye. This is part of a complete episode.
Transcript of “Bullseye Origin”
Hello, you have a wait with words.
Hello, my name is Jack. I’m calling from San Diego.
Hi, Jack. How you doing?
Good. Great.
We’re glad to have you. What’s going on?
Well, I was just wondering where the term bullseye came from.
Bullseye. And what’s making you wonder about the term bullseye? Where have you heard it?
Well, I’ve heard it in many movies, action movies.
And I was just wondering, like, I was thinking about it.
I thought maybe they shot bullseye.
Oh.
I wanted to learn more.
Good attitude.
Yes, we’re really glad you called.
And what would you think if I told you that it had to do with the fact that a bullseye is round and so is a traditional target?
Oh, really?
Yeah.
Really?
Yeah, you know, like, the target symbol for, like, the department store Target with the red and white circles?
Yeah, yeah.
That’s a bullseye, right?
Yeah.
Yeah.
If you think about it.
Yeah, very abstract.
Round with a circle in the middle.
Like when you’re shooting arrows in archery, right?
You see that kind of target?
Yeah, yeah.
So did they shoot it?
How big did it get?
Like a big enough so they can shoot it right in the pupil?
Well, no, it’s just something that looks like a bullseye.
They didn’t really use an actual bullseye.
As far as we know, they didn’t shoot bulls in the eye.
No, because bulls are valuable animals.
You wouldn’t want to just practice shooting on an animal that was worth a lot, right?
Yeah.
Yeah.
So, yeah, since the early 19th century, several different things that were round were sometimes compared to a bull’s eye.
Because if you think about it, I mean, what’s the biggest animal that you see in this country?
I mean.
Besides elephants in the zoo, but naturally occurring animals on a day to day.
Yeah.
Yeah.
It’s a bull.
A bull is one of the bigger animals.
And so the term bullseye was actually used to describe round windows.
Oh, yeah.
There’s a French term for that.
Yeah.
Really?
Yeah, and a kind of coin.
Oye de bouffe.
Right.
And so the idea all along is pretty much what Grant was saying,
That if you think about just drawing a bull’s eye,
It’s going to look pretty much like the bull’s eye on Target.
Yeah, the actual animal eyeball.
Wow.
Yeah, you know, humans do that.
We take things in the real world and we do similes and metaphors to say, that’s a lot like that.
I’m just going to go ahead and call it that name.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Wow.
I didn’t think to hear that answer.
Oh, we’re glad to help.
Yeah, glad to delight you, little guy.
Jack, I got to tell you, you got energy and spirit and I like it.
Thank you.
My heart is beating fast right now.
Hey, you’re a superstar.
You’re doing great.
All right.
Yeah.
And we’re really happy you called us.
All right.
You call us again sometime, Jack?
Yeah, definitely.
All right.
Okay, great.
Cheers.
All right. Good luck.
Thank you.
Bye.
All right. Bye-bye.
